Paranormality and the Perception of Reality

The Non-Magical Magic System

I study the paranormal (what a way to start an essay about magic systems in RPGs), not as a believer, but as someone who wonders, “Does the unreal affect what some perceive as real?” or “Does believing in the paranormal make it bleed into the believer’s reality?” My studies led me to Professor Chris French and his anomalistic psychology studies. At the same time, I found myself fascinated by philosophy, particularly the idea that our understanding of reality is shaped as much by recognition as by objective truth. In the master–slave dialectic, Hegel explores how power and identity are shaped through recognition between individuals.

That idea stuck with me: perhaps the supernatural works the same way. Whether magic exists may matter less than whether people behave as if it does. Reading Chris French’s 2004 book, The Science of Weird Shit, while running a Bronze Age-inspired game, I came across an idea. What if the magic in a game was no more than suggestive effects created in combination between the GM and the magic user?

In D&D (or equivalents), you say something like, “I cast Fireball.” Which is cool and all, but the problem with it is that everyone knows what will happen. Maybe it goes wrong, but it’s embedded in the word itself what the plausible course of action will be.

In this new non-magical magic system, you will say something like, “I cursed the king,” and perform a ritual inside a tent for three nights, sacrificing a goat and drinking its blood, seeing the image of the king lying on the floor appear in the smoke. Three months later, the king shows up dead after falling from his horse during a royal hunt. Was it the spell? Was it supernatural? You can’t say for sure, but the important part is, “Does your character believe it was?”

The core principle is: Magic is a narrative suggestion. The ritual and its effectiveness are kept secret, and the rolls determine if it will ever manifest, when, and how. It may never happen. It may be a coincidence. You will never know. But will people behave as though it did?

The way it works is with three layers:

Intent, the most important: to harm, to protect, to find, to bring, to repel, and so forth.

Equivalence, a sacrifice or component heavy on symbolism: a stag for a king, a crow for a vision, your own hand for protection, and so on, chosen by the player based on their interpretation.

Ritual, the ritual itself, which must be created by the player. Again, symbolism plays a heavy role here. If the player wants to bring rain to a dry land, they must call for it from the top of the mountain, calling the clouds for nine nights straight. The way the player wants to do it is up to them.

Characters with a supernatural tradition begin play knowing a couple of rituals, no more than four. These are not “true” because they objectively work, but because generations of practitioners have performed them and passed them down.

List of example rituals (the GM must create a list of their own for their own setting).

Intent: Protect harvest
Equivalence: A young life for many lives.
Ritual: Bury the body of a newborn goat beneath the first seed planted that season.

Intent: Receive visions.
Equivalence: Take sight from one creature to gain another’s.
Ritual: Kill a crow on a moonless night and sleep with one of its feathers beneath your tongue.

Intent: Prevent conflict.
Equivalence: Weapon supply.
Ritual: Snap all weapons over your knee and bury both halves facing opposite directions.

Intent: Stop the flood.
Equivalence: Destroy all water supply.
Ritual: Bathe a bronze knife with the water supply, then sink it into a river to stop floods.

Then it’s up to the player to come up with new ones. For example, “If protecting the harvest involves burying the newborn goat, and preventing conflict needs weapons split in half and buried pointing in different directions, what if I bury the goat and plant the seed facing different directions? Would it bring pestilence to my enemies’ crops?”.

The player needs to practice reasoning by analogy.

“If this works because of these symbolic relationships, then maybe changing one element changes the outcome.”

They may think: “The burial seems important. The newborn goat seems to represent life. The opposite directions seem to represent separation or dispersion. I bury a newborn goat with seeds, but plant the goat facing east and the seeds facing west. Separate life from growth. Let my enemy’s fields reject their crops.”

The GM doesn’t compare this to a hidden recipe. Instead, they ask, “Does this feel like a coherent piece of folk magic?“ If the answer is yes, the ritual may work. Emphasis on the “may”, because the player is never supposed to know if the ritual worked.

So how would a GM ask for a roll or advocate in favor of the outcome?

The GM must ask for a roll for the ritual, but the roll does not determine whether the supernatural intervenes. It determines how well the ritual was performed. This can be modified by their Knowledge/Wisdom or equivalent.

A poor roll means:

• you forgot part of the chant;

• you hesitated during the sacrifice;

• the fire went out;

• witnesses mocked the ceremony.

A great roll means:

• the ritual felt perfect;

• everyone present was deeply affected;

• even you leave believing something happened.

But why?

If the ritual was well executed, the GM must now take it into account. A possibility of the king dying must be added to the story at some point. Something new emerged from the game.

The GM secretly notes: “The player wants to kill the king,” and adds that possibility to the game. At the end of every session, or whenever the GM feels it is appropriate, they must roll a d6.

On a 1, the ritual presses against reality.

What does that mean? Not that the king dies. It means the GM introduces an opportunity that aligns with the ritual’s intent.

Perhaps:

• the king insists on joining a dangerous hunt;

• his horse becomes unusually skittish;

• he develops a fever before a battle;

• an ambitious noble decides now is the time to strike.

For every new possibility, a Fate Die must be rolled. If the result is odd, the events lean toward the ritual’s intent.

But does the ritual become part of the story? That’s up to the players to interpret, and the people around them to be convinced as such.

For example, the king is dead. If the characters made a fuss about the ritual and word spread, people may start to whisper, “The curse worked.”

Or perhaps, if the ritual was done in secrecy, people may blame poor riding or the bad weather. “He couldn’t see anything with that mist.” Only the caster may know, but even they can never know for sure.

But do practitioners ever become better at magic?

In their day-to-day adventuring, they play much more like a thief, fighter, or any other ordinary adventurer, relying on other skills rather than certain magic. But, every newly discovered ritual (by adventuring) brings something new for the player to mix with rituals they already know, and make new stuff to use when reasoning with the GM for their success.

What difference does it make?

Magic or not, the king is dead. But you need to remember the original idea behind this rule: Does the unreal affect what some perceive as real? Foucault explored how categories and beliefs shape reality. A society’s understanding of “madness” changes how people diagnosed as mad are treated. The category itself changes the world. In this example: “The king is cursed.” Even if no supernatural force exists, the belief changes how everyone interacts with the king. Interpretation can become more powerful than truth.

Whether the king died because of a curse, because his horse stumbled, or because fate finally caught up with him is a question the game refuses to answer. But the history surrounding his death changes: What do the characters believe happened? What stories do they tell afterward? What rumors spread across the kingdom? How do those beliefs change the decisions people make? Is the supernatural real?